Guatemalan police assault and fire tear gas at migrant caravan

Guatemala City, January 19 (RHC)-- The Guatemalan National Civil Police attacked on Monday the caravan of more than 9,000 Hondurans.  The security forces tried to forcibly disperse the migrants on their way northward to the United States.

Gilda Silvestrucci, teleSUR correspondent in Honduras, reported that the police hit and fired tear gas against hundreds of migrants on Monday afternoon, including women and children, which is a significant violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Local media outlets report that over 500 members of the police and the army evacuated the road in Vado Hondo, Chiquimula department, near the Honduras border, where migrants have been stranded since Saturday. Nonetheless, the migrants refuse to go back to Honduras as they made white flags out of their clothing and requested that Guatemalan authorities let them advance peacefully.

The Honduran government asked the Guatemalan authorities for an explanation after such repression. Meanwhile, the Mexican ambassador in Guatemala,  Gerardo Simon, said that over 15 thousand soldiers and about three thousand agents of the National Institute of Migration await the migrant caravan upon their arrival in Mexico.